Silence Of The Hams

Nowack and getting the two of you on a committee.“
    “Why aren’t I surprised that you didn’t forget that?“ Jane asked.
    As she watched Patsy leave, she smiled to herself. She thought she’d so cleverly guided Patsy into talking about Robert Stonecipher when, in fact, Patsy had been pulling her along on a leash. Yes, Patsy and Shelley were going to get along well.

10

    “Shelley, I’ve got to run some errands. Ride along? I have very interesting things to tell you.“
    “I’m amazed. It’s only ten in the morning and you were up all night and you’re still able to speak English fairly fluently?“
    “I found a cot in the nurse’s room at school and got a lovely three-hour nap, then came home at six in the morning and slept till nine. I’m actually pretty close to human today. If you don’t count my hair,“ Jane replied.
    “Jane, I never consider your hair. Give me five minutes to gather up some dry cleaning I need to drop off.”
    A few minutes later, Shelley, nearly buried in a pile of Paul’s shirts and suits, was sitting in the passenger seat as Jane backed out of the driveway, carefully avoiding the pothole the family was affectionately starting to call the Grand Canyon.
    “I have a ton of interesting stuff to tell you,“ Jane said. “But the most interesting is that Robert Stonecipher died of a heart attack a good five or ten minutes, at least, before somebody pushed that rack of hams over on him.”
    Shelley whipped her head around and looked at Jane as if she were crazy. “What? You mean this?“
    “The coroner or pathologist or whoever swears to it. Mel told me last night. He’d just found out. Stonecipher wasn’t murdered.“
    “But somebody made it look like he had been!“ Shelley said. “I’m dumbfounded. Why would anybody do that?“
    “I’ve been brooding on it for a while and I can think of two reasons,“ Jane said. “One sort of reasonable, one sort of goofy. If he had life insurance like my husband did, it would pay double if he died by accident. Double jeopardy—I mean, double indemnity. I always mix those up.“
    “Pointing to Rhonda,“ Shelley said.
    Jane shrugged. “If he had life insurance with that provision and if she were the beneficiary. But he might have other policies as well. You can have more than one life insurance policy, can’t you, if you’re willing to pay the premiums?“
    “I don’t know. I would guess you could. So he might have had one for the girlfriend you heard about. Or even one that paid to his business.“
    “Oh, that’s something else I learned. The girlfriend is Emma Weyrich and I have lots more about her. What I wonder is, can you insure somebody else’s life with yourself as beneficiary?“
    “I’m pretty sure you can,“ Shelley said. “But I don’t really know a lot about insurance.“
    “Then you probably won’t know what else I was wondering about which is, if you can insure someone else, can you do it without their knowledge? But this is all wandering from the main point, which is that an accidental death might pay off a lot better than a heart attack.“
    “Emma Weyrich,“ Shelley mused. “We should have guessed. She’s not the young bimbo I had imagined, but—“
    “More of an early middle-aged bimbo,“ Jane agreed. “But a health nut like he was, and an employee constantly in his company.”
    Jane pulled into the parking lot of the dry cleaners. It was the Dohertys’ new establishment, the one Stonecipher had been trying to shut down. Jane always patronized them because they were a nice couple who deserved all the business they could get. She was curious to know if they’d heard yet about the real cause of Stonecipher’s death, but a teenage girl who was their Saturday helper was at the front counter.
    When they were back in the car, Shelley said, “So what’s the goofy reason for making a natural death look unnatural?”
    Jane eased into traffic and headed toward the library. “To make Conrad look bad. To try to hurt his business by linking him to Stone-cipher’s death.“
    “But there’s no reason to think Conrad did it just because it happened at the deli.“
    “I know. But if somebody like that Foster Hanlon person found Stonecipher dead and was still steamed about losing the battle with Conrad and what he imagines is the lowering of property values, he might figure that making the deli look like a dangerous place might hurt Conrad’s business enough to shut him down. It doesn’t make